Seduce Me in Flames (32 page)

He immediately began to rewind their hastily orchestrated coupling in his mind, seeking something that he had done wrong or, worse, neglected to do for her. Had he hurt her after all? Been too selfish? Too crass?

“What is it?” He blurted out the words before he could check himself. He’d apparently grown too accustomed to being forthcoming with her and now couldn’t make himself hold his own tongue, not even to spare his own male ego. “What did I do? Are you hurt?”

She giggled like a young girl, quickly covering her mouth when she heard the sound escape her own lips. She tried to lift her posture into something resembling the regal creature she was supposed to be, but failed miserably as she remained brazenly entangled with him, her floating legs wound gently around the backs of his while her fingers toyed with his hair. She certainly wasn’t otherwise acting the part of a woman who’d been cheated of a special first experience. That was the only thing that kept him from shrilly repeating his demands.

“You did nothing wrong. Everything was perfect,” she insisted, her sultry lips popping over the word perfect in a way that sent an arousing vibration down the length of his spent cock.

“Perfect?” he echoed. “Then what is that reservation
I see in your eyes? And don’t try to deny it. You might perhaps convince someone else, but you won’t convince me.”

“Mmm.” She smiled and reached to press a slow kiss to his chin, his jaw, and then his cheek. “Perhaps not perfect,” she agreed. “Perhaps it might be improved only had you not pulled away at the last moment.”

Silence and breathing ticked between them for a long minute as their gazes locked, each trying to read through layers of things about the other they had yet to learn. It was Ambrea who abruptly decided she didn’t want to hear whatever harsh truth there was behind his actions.

“But I thank you for it,” she said quietly as she looked away. “The Empress of Allay cannot turn up pregnant under these conditions. Nor would it be wise for me to bring forth a child into such a risky climate around me. If you would like, I can see my personal medic about contraception, so it will not be an issue any longer.”

She didn’t wait for him to reply. She unwound herself from him and, sliding past him on the right, she entered the water and stepped beneath the flow of the waterfall.

Rush ran a hand back through his hair, searching for something to say. The truth was she had spared him the need for saying anything. He would be much better off to leave it at that. With a nod of his head, he decided to do exactly that. After all, what she was saying made perfect sense, though he had to admit that her perspective had not entered his mind for even an instant. He had more than enough of his own reasons for seeing to it that she didn’t get pregnant.

“You don’t have to do that,” he said as he watched her wash her body clean of all traces of their lovemaking.

“Oh?” She cocked a brow.

“The IM has much more efficient methods of contraception than those of Allay.”

“Oh.” She sighed, closed her eyes, and turned her face up to the stream of water.

“Besides, you know how quickly gossip will fly. And we don’t know if you can trust your medics yet, even if it’s just to keep their mouths shut.”

“True.”

She wasn’t looking at him at all, seemingly completely preoccupied with her bathing. Truth be told, he was finding her bathing a bit preoccupying as well. There was something wholly distracting about watching her run her hands over her own skin that had his spent body instantly stirring back to life. But her lack of engagement as she spoke to him raised a red flag in his head. He was all too aware of how she now purposely sought out direct eye contact with others when she spoke with them.

He opened his mouth to speak, not really knowing what he was going to say, wondering why he was determined to challenge her when it was a matter best left exactly the way it was. But before he could get out a single word, she said, “There was a guard in the wet rooms. Durbin Cara I think was his name. He was very good to me. And clearly he was very loyal to me. He did whatever he could to see to my comfort, even sometimes risking his job or perhaps a reprimand in order to do so. I think he would be a good man to bring up closer to me.”

Words died in his throat, but still his mouth remained open as if poised for speaking. He watched as she walked to the steps and exited the tub.

“You should get dressed. Dry your hair,” she instructed him. “We shouldn’t be alone together for too long. As it is, our being cloistered together is considered an unseemly act. It leaves us open to just the sort of gossip you are hoping to avoid.”

“We,”
he bit out sharply. “You are hoping to avoid them thinking you have a Tarian beast in your bed.”

She turned to look at him, the glance she shot him that cold, concise look she had used to cut down the paxor earlier.

“Think what you will. Anything I say to the contrary will no doubt be ignored or disbelieved as usual.”

“As usual?” he ground out. He immediately moved to leap out of the water, hoisting himself onto the ledge and pushing up into his full height within seconds. He marched up to her, his wet feet slapping across the tile as she dismissively stepped beneath a dryer and engaged the cycle. The machine’s hum was distinct but low enough for him to be heard over without raising his voice too much. His pricked temper more readily demanded a raise in his voice. “You say that like I’m the one who comes from a country full of bigots who’d just as soon wipe their asses with you than give you the time of day. It’s your precious reputation we’re needing to protect, Princess, not mine. You and I both know what just about the whole damn galaxy thinks of Tarians.”

“Just about,” she countered quietly as the dryer cycle spun down softly. She stepped out of the marked ring on the floor, her hair now perfectly dry and running in crimped waves down her back. Her smooth skin was soft and dry but was no longer unblemished. She was bruised and scraped in places, places where he’d grabbed hold of her a bit too hard. He hadn’t even realized he’d done that. But nowhere did he see a burn on her. It was an almost delightful sort of normalcy to see her like that.

Normal except for what they were talking about. There was no mistaking what she meant by that contrary little “just about.” She meant that she had never once seen him for anything other than who he was. Not the bias of his being Tarian. Not the fear of his being a
freakish mutant. She had never reacted the way others did. But she knew as well as he did that most of her people were not going to be as open-minded as she was, and she had to be careful. Especially with Balkin lurking in the background. The very instant public opinion turned against her, he would seize the opportunity to win back their fickle attentions. And the only way he could seize an opportunity would be over her dead body.

Rush stepped under the dryer and let it cycle on, but his finger had barely left the button before hers appeared and punched it off again. He looked at her quizzically.

“Rush, you don’t need to use a dryer. You have one built into your own body.”

“Yeah, if you want me to leave telltale scorch marks all over your fancy tile,” he sniped sarcastically.

“Really? Are you that convinced that you are too weak to exert even just a little control over this?” she wanted to know.

That statement royally irked him, as, he had no doubt, she had intended it to. Rush knew she was playing him by dangling some sort of ego-bruising psychology in front of him, but knowing that didn’t make it any less effective a tool in her arsenal. The truth was, he had always despised the idea of this thing being stronger than he was. The only way he’d ever been able to exert power over it was by keeping it shut off altogether. He’d been able to do that since he was a boy. What she was talking about was a true act of control. The power of his will containing the wild conflagration always itching for freedom inside him. The most he’d ever been able to do was let just a little bit eke out to light up his hand and arm. That was it. And even that wasn’t what he could call control. He couldn’t call it control if it didn’t feel controlled.

“Step back,” he warned her.

She looked as though she was going to argue with him, but she did step back. She also looked as though she was ready to jump on his back if he even thought about going for the dryer switch again. He was instantly nervous the moment he decided to try this little act of insanity. His palms would have gone wet with perspiration if they weren’t already wet from the bath. He remained inside the circle marked on the tiles for the dryer. If worse came to worst, he supposed they could blame any scorching on a faulty dryer mechanism.

“Think of it like not letting out flame, but just an increase in your natural body temperature,” she said suddenly. “You’re always so warm. Just a few degrees more and you’ll steam all the water off your body.”

It wasn’t a half-bad concept. But conceptualizing and actualizing were a huge distance from each other as far as he was concerned. He’d never tried anything like this, and every time he’d ever let loose there had always been flame involved. How did he know whether what she was asking for was even possible?

At first he tried to close his eyes and focus, but he heard her step closer and it made him open his eyes so he could watch her warily. He didn’t want her to get too close.

“You’ve done it before,” she said softly.

“I have not!” he argued tightly.

“If you had produced flame at the time, you would have set my shirt on fire when you burned me. You’ve done this before—grown hot without growing flame.”

She was right, he realized with surprise. When he experienced arousal. But that reaction was completely out of his control. Still, it meant he was capable of doing it. He simply had to figure out how to do it without the wild stimulus of sexual need and with total reign over the response.

“Warmer,” she said softly.

He thought about becoming warmer. It felt surreal when he’d spent so many years doing the opposite. Stranger still, looking into her eyes was like holding on to an anchor. It helped steady him. It made him feel strong in a strange metaphysical way. After so many years as a soldier, a grunt who lived by the power and development of his body and the percussive, persuasive force of his explosives, he’d never considered himself much of a high-thinking man. His connection to the spirits of his people had been broken the day his people had betrayed him. How could he have faith in those gods when the ways of those spirits had been taught to him by such hypocrites?

“Rush!”

Thinking of his home world was such an emotional trigger for him, and the wrong place to go right then, that his hands had erupted in flame. Quickly he dismissed all that emotional flotsam. He took several deep breaths to withdraw the flame from his fingertips and palms. It disappeared. But he tried to make the heat remain, tried to let it ripple all down his body. The air around him seemed to bend and waver. He realized it was water molecules evaporating into the air all around him. He reached to touch his hair and felt it was nearly dry. A second longer and it was completely so. Now the trick would be to tamp it down again. To his surprise, it was quite simple. After only a few beats, the air became normal around him.

“I think I’m dry.”

Ambrea reached out with tentative fingers to touch the hair on his forearm. She smiled brilliantly and then wrapped her hand around his wrist, proving to him that she wasn’t being burned.

“One day,” she said, “I believe you will be able to do
that while I’m holding your hand and you will exhibit enough control to keep from burning me.”

For the very first time, Rush believed it too.

Suddenly their conversation about the prejudices against him harbored by the worlds around them no longer held any import. This breakthrough with the guidance of the one woman he knew would never hold his heritage against him triumphed over anything that anyone else might think of him.

“My, my. You do seem cozy with the Lady Suna.”

Eirie sniffed at the elegance of title given to such a girl as that. Really, a fifth daughter of a very wealthy merchant? How had she risen enough to become companion to even a disgraced and disowned princess? There was no nobility to her. But still, the wealth of her father must have been a powerful motivator. Benit must have needed him for some reason or other and had paid the merchant back with the strange favor of exiling his daughter with the princess. The Lady Suna had even been imprisoned twice with Ambrea.

But how clever it turned out to be, because now that fallen princess was empress. Perhaps the Lady Suna’s father had outfoxed Benit Tsu Allay in the long run.

“Suna is a simpleton. She is trained just enough in court etiquette to get by as the companion of an exiled princess, but here she is a lost little fish floundering among the sharks. I doubt she would last the week without me. Now her mistress—that’s a bit of a puzzle.”

Balkin’s only response was a contemptuous growl low in his throat.

“Suit yourself,” Eirie said dismissively. “Personally, an adversary is not worth tussling with if she’s going to be light prey.”